It has been
a long time in the making - through words and energy -- so that we could meet,
share and build with the Strength of Wayuu Women. On different occasions we
were able to offer workshops or see each other in shared spaces, but on this
occasion, it was the first time we were able to directly link up and support
the process of the Strength of Wayuu Women.
In 2012,
the largest open pit coal mining company in the world, Cerrejon, located in the
south of the department of La Guajira, presented a project to extract 500
million tons of coal that is found beneath the path of the Rancheria River,
forcing the river to be diverted from its natural cause some 26 km. The people
of La Guajira rose up in defense of its most important river and Cerrejon was
forced to leave the issue alone. Three years later Cerrejon now tries to do the
same with Bruno Arroyo, using the threat of laying off hundreds of workers from
the mine if they are not able to move forward with their project. 
The Bruno Arroyo springs to life in the Perija Mountains and according to Cerrejon it is
one of the 51 tributaries of the Rancheria, contributing 3.6% to its total flow
as well as being the main water source for the municipalities of Maicao, Hato
Nuevo and Albania. As they tried before, Cerrejon pretends that the final 4.8
Km of the Bruno Arroyo be re directed 3.6 Km from its current course in the
municipality of Albania. That stretch of the Arroyo would be moved some 700 meters north facilitating the expanding of the limits of the mine 170 Hectares,
thus providing access to 35 million tons of coal. If not able to achieve this
the company threatens the loss of; 600 jobs, $500,000.00 in local investments,
$3.7 billion in local compensations and the loss of 3 million tons/year of
coal. The company’s threats and bullying
are not for nothing; Cerrejon is projected to expand its area in a project
called P40, in which they are investing $1,300 million in aims of increasing
production from 32 to 40 million tons of coal/year as of this year (2015).
If achieved, the region would benefit from
5,000 jobs for the duration of the project´s operation. What the project does
not take into account, however, are the impacts and the consequences that the
people of La Guajira will have to face. Since Cerrejon started to mine for coal
the soil has been degraded and no longer supports local ecosystems; over a
dozen arroyos (tributaries of the Rancheria) and springs have dried out;
surface and subterranean waters have been polluted; over 12,000 Ha of dry
tropical forest has been destroyed as well as the forced displacement of 20,000
Guajiro people and the destruction of 10 communities. Currently Hato Nuevo and
Albania have a population of 45,000 people and consume about 7.5 million liters
of water daily. Cerrejon daily uses 17 million liters of water to wet the dirt
roads. According to recent satellite images, the Rancheria River´s flow dries
after passing through the Cerrejon which in total uses about 35 million liters
of water daily -- enough to support about 3 million people. 
What the
statistics of tons of coal, hectares of land and liters of water do not tell us
are the social and cultural impacts on the population of La Guajira. By diverting
the Rancheria, Bruno, or any other river or arroyo in La Guajira, the
inhabitants of the territory will be condemned to extermination. All of the
impacts that the company omits or refuses to recognize; that the Wayuu and the Afro-descendants can no longer have their rancherias and grow their yuca, plantain,
pumpkin, corn and beans; they can no longer pastor their goats or let their
chickens run free: they can no longer live off the same foods or collect what
they need from the bush; they can no longer go to the river, arroyo or jagüey
to wash clothes, bathe, gather water to drink or cook or so the goats can drink.
They are now forced to have to look for money even though the jobs in the mine
are not intended for them. 
The
landscape will become something different altogether; a privatized territory
covered in active mines, highways, power lines, pipelines, mountains of rubble
and mine tailings, ashes of what were trees and water contaminated or dried.
Now the Wayuu and Black folk that once lived free and autonomous in their territory
are being relocated into resettlements made by the Cerrejon which break with
the Guajiro culture of having enramadas (wall-less traditional structures) made
of logs and mud spread out across the territory intermixed with crops, forest
and pasture which has been turned into lots with rows of houses, no trees and
surrounded by barbed wire. For the Wayuu, the territory and water are life, the
ability to have their rancheria, walk freely in their territory with their
goats, surrounded by plants, forests and animals that live there because of the
water. The danger that threatens the dry tropical forests, the arroyos, the
springs, and the river, is the same danger for the Wayuu, the Afro and all
Guajiros. What Cerrejon is trying to do is nothing short of ethnocide and
ecocide. 
The wild
animals that survive this massacre will have their image prostituted by the
company for its corporate branding and marketing. Cerrejon is an exceptional
example of a company that greenwashes its image. Throughout La Guajira on the
highways one can observe billboards with smiling Wayuu women, children
liberating hatchling sea turtles and warnings for drivers to be careful with
wildlife crossing the roads.
Cerrejon
has business agreements with Conservation International (CI), an institutional
environmental organization that has ties to many companies responsible for
environmental and social destruction on massive scales; companies such as
Coca-Cola, Northrop Grumman Corp., Starbucks and Shell. CI is an entity that promotes
itself as the forefront of biodiversity conservation through its photographs of
human and biological diversity, when in reality it is front - propaganda - that
washes the image of companies and industries that want to appear that they do
good for the environment. Their environmental projects are merely a media
spectacle that in their size and scale has no comparison to the salaries of the
management of Cerrejon, not to mention the environmental destruction and losses
generated. 
CI is an agency that legitimizes green capitalism on a planet that is not dying but that
is being killed due to the interests of small, economically powerful
sector. In addition to covering up for
ecological destructive companies, CI is similar to other environmental entities such as the World Wildlife Federation and the Nature Conservancy that have been
linked to “environmental conservation” projects that have been imposed on local
and indigenous communities which have ultimately resulted in violence, forced
displacement and even death for these peoples.
The bees
have had experiences with indigenous communities in Cauca that told us how they
collaborated with CI to conduct biodiversity studies in their territory to only
later have CI keep all the results of the studies , thus stealing the knowledge
of the elders and of the territory.
This is the
context that the south of La Guajira finds itself in and these were the issues
that we built upon and made an effort to support in the schools and rancherias
we visited. The first community where we arrived was in the Municipality of
Barrancas, the rural primary school of the community of Campo Alegre.
Surrounded by Araguaney trees, cattle and cotton crops, we were in the school
with children who all spoke Wayuunaiki as their first language and Spanish the
second language they use. With help from a bilingual teacher we did an exercise
of identifying the animals in the Mesoamérica Resiste graphic in both Spanish
and Wayuunaiki, followed by a long session of coloring the poster with crayons.
From the hill where the school is located in the distance, along the horizon
one could see the immense Cerrejon mine that is growing and reaching towards
the community. 
The next
community where we pollinated the graphic campaign was in the rancheria and
school of Eulalia, which lies along the railroad that transports the coal from
the Cerrejon mine to Bolivar Port in the Upper Guajira. The reality of La
Guajira is just as it is shown in the Mesoamérica Resiste graphic with the
scene of militarization occurring right next to the mine, everywhere around the
mine, along the railroad and in the port where there is a constant heavy
military presence. Every couple of kilometers there is a squadron of soldiers
that are camped out taking care of the mine´s infrastructure and thus live in
the area, interact and form part of everyday life for the Wayuu communities that
call this home. 
The
workshop in Eulalia was one of the best we ever had. When we arrived we hung
the Mesoamérica Resiste and the True Cost of Coal banners and once everyone
arrived, we introduced ourselves and gave a brief overview about what the
banners were about. Afterwards the participants, mostly youth from the
community, formed groups and carefully analyzed the banners, classifying scenes
with themes in their presentations. Each group was motivated to share and
present what they explored, and the exercise extended into the night using the
video projector and flashlights to illuminate the banners to see as they were
explained in the darkness. There were some participants that were in the
workshop we did last year in the Boarding School of Akuaipa that came prepared
to participate and support the newer folks in their groups. After the dynamic
methodology we used to explore and learn from the banners, some short films
that were made in the community were shown on the projector. The films were
about the Wayuu perspective of peace and the negotiations going on in Havana,
Cuba between the government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia
(FARC) as well as another fictional piece about initiation ritual and ceremony
a Wayuu girl goes through upon receiving their first menstruation. 
Another
afternoon we had a short visit to the community of Nuevo Espinal located near
Campo Alegre also in the Municipality of Barrancas. Both of the communities are
found in a region where the Cerrejon mine wants to expand their coal extraction.
Currently the company representatives are meeting with community leaders
attempting to minimize the chances that one of these leaders take up a position
against the mine´s expansion. The same afternoon we went to Nuevo Espinal as did
a member of the Strength of Wayuu Women to speak with the adults about their
rights regarding the Cerrejon mine while we the bees hung our banners. We
briefly explained the banner to the adults and then worked with the children to
color a poster of Mesoamérica Resiste while we spoke about the names of the
animals in the poster in Wayuunaiki and Spanish. 
The last
school we visited with the Strength of Wayuu Women was the school of the
community of San Francisco on the outskirts of Barrancas town. At first, the
idea was to do the workshop with the students of 4th and 5th grade, but the
other students became very excited as they watched from the windows of their
classrooms the banners waving in the wind under the covered sports court, that
all the other students came pouring out to participate. The banners of
Mesoamérica Resiste and The True Cost of Coal hung from a fence around the
sports field as all the children divided into three groups, taking turns with
each banner exploring the graphics and the different scenes as well as drawing
in their notebooks what they found most interesting. In this workshop we
realized something we had sort of noticed in some of the other workshops: the
students who do speak and know Wayuunaiki lacked knowledge of the animal´s
names in their native language. The teachers would ask the students to identify
animals in the banner in Wayuunaiki and the children would respond in Spanish,
they would say rabbit instead of Atpana. Afterwards we asked if they had ever
seen a rabbit and they all responded that they had not. This moment became a clear example of how
the loss of biological diversity is accompanied by the loss of linguistic
diversity. 
The last
community on this visit to La Guajira where we could share was the rancheria of
Jepimana found between Uribia and Cuatro Vías.
In Jepimana adults, youth and some children were present. After hanging
the banners we realized after speaking some minutes in Spanish that most people
were not paying attention, fortunately one person who had accompanied us for
most of the week along with two youth who were at the workshop in Eulalia
already understood the banners and had experience working with them. Entirely
in Wayuunaiki they took control and explained the banners to the folks present.
The bees merely served as guides and helped remind the themes of different
scenes, but the majority of all the explanation and analysis was done by the
Wayuunaiki speakers who had been present in the previous workshops, thus
clearly demonstrating how communities can appropriate and empower themselves
through illustrated tools such as the graphic campaigns of the Beehive Design
Collective. In this workshop the issue of greenwashing was spoken about in
Wayuunaiki, referring to how Cerrejon and Conservation International generate a
false appearance regarding coal mining in La Guajira, using an advertisement of
Cerrejon with sea turtles in the Diario Del Norte newspaper. 
As with
many previous experiences, our time in La Guajira with the Strength of Wayuu
Women went by very quickly and we were left with the desire to return soon to
continue weaving and pollinating together. We left with invitations to return
to all the communities that we had visited with the banners to continue sharing
the graphics as part of the educational process but also invitations to
participate in projects regarding biodiversity and linguistic diversity and an
agro-ecology & permaculture project. We hope to return soon and continue to
share with the different communities of the Strength of Wayuu Women, support
the processes of struggle and land defense against the diversion of the Bruno
Arroyo, but also to create new processes to improve La Guajira for the Wayuu,
Afro-descendants and all of its ecosystems. To support the Strength of Wayuu
Women by having their own banner of Mesoamérica Resiste or to support any other
initiative that is being worked upon with the Strength of Wayuu Women please
contact: polinizaciones@gmail.com.
